Temple should be built through national consensus: Uma Bharati

Union Minister for Sports Uma Bharati on Sunday said Ram temple should be constructed at Ayodhya through a national consensus on the lines the Somnath temple was re-built in Gujarat.

Addressing a VHP-organised rally in Bangalore to protest the Godhra train carnage, Uma Bharati lashed out at the Congress and other 'so called secular parties' who, she charged, were 'differentiating between the Hindu and Muslim blood".

"Congress President Sonia Gandhi went in a delegation along with other parties to the President demanding resignation of Narendra Modi government, but did her husband Rajiv Gandhi quit as prime minister when 10,000 Sikhs were massacred in Delhi riots instigated by Congress?" she asked.

"They are differentiating between the lives of Hindus and Muslims," she alleged, adding that 'whether it is Hindus or Muslims, it is the innocent lives that are being lost'.

She said no words were 'strong enough' to condemn the Godhra incident as also the violence in the backlash to it.

Uma Bharati, who made an unscheduled appearance at the rally saying she came to meet Visweshathirtha Swamiji of Pejawar Mutt, a front ranking VHP leader, also took a dig at a section of the media whom she blamed for portraying as if 'it is only the Hindus who are perpetrators of attacks'.

Visweshathirtha Swamiji, one of the VHP founders, asserted that Ram temple must be built at Ayodhya and appealed to Muslims not to come in the way and instead help in resolving the issue peacefully.